Web Content Management with Open Source Software

Transcription

1 Web Content Management with Open Source Software Abhijeet Chavan Chief Technology Officer, Urban Insight Co-Editor, Planetizen Presented at the The Third Annual Southern California Linux Expo January 11th, 2005 Los Angeles, CA Copyright 2005, Abhijeet Chavan This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License. See

2 Outline Web Content Management Systems (CMS) Proprietary / Custom-built / Open Source Benefits of Open Source CMSes The LAMP Platform Open Source CMSes Tips Resources

3 Types of Websites Static websites: pre-built HTML pages Vending machine: packaged, limited personalization Dynamic websites - pages built on demand Fine restaurant: Served fresh with a personal touch Growing expectations: Online collaboration, knowledge management E-commerce, e-government, e-learning

4 Content Management Systems (CMS) Software system to facilitate management of website content Data is generally stored in a database Separation of content and visual display Includes tools for managing users and workflow

5 CMS Benefits Enables non-technical staff to add, edit, and manage website content Maintains a consistent look-and-feel across a website and makes it easy to change design Facilitates gathering, organizing, and archiving information Search tools facilitate information retrieval Can supplement or replace -based collaboration

6 Proprietary CMSes: Benefits Quick and complete solution Technical support available

7 Proprietary CMSes: Drawbacks Are you buying more than you need? Beware of vendor lock-in Expensive licensing costs Closed source may hinder customization Restrictive license may prevent redistribution

8 Custom Built CMSes: Benefits Built to your specifications Not dependent on a commercial vendor Can be customized Can be redistributed or sold Build in-house technical expertise

9 Custom Built CMSes: Drawbacks Need in-house technical expertise Can be complex and time-consuming to build Can be expensive to build and maintain Can you sustain in-house technical support?

10 Build It Yourself With Open Source Why you should consider using Open Source components to build your own custom CMS: Freedom from licensing costs Freedom to modify and redistribute Libraries, examples, & code snippets available Strong community to provide support Expertise and experience is transferable

11 Open Source LAMP Platform

12 Planetizen Custom-built CMS using open source Community website for urban planners

13 Planetizen 2 Built with GNU/Linux, Apache, PHP, MySQL Started development in early 2000 Low hardware costs No software costs Development tools: Emacs, VIM, CVS. Launched in June 2000

14 Planetizen 3 Easily customized Look-n-feel different from pre-built CMSes Great learning opportunity Slow to introduce new features as they required extra development effort and time Migrating to an established pre-built open source CMS.

15 UIPublish Custom CMS using open source components Released under GNU General Public License

16 UIPublish 2 Publishing articles, announcements, events, etc. Integration with a static website Started in 2000 First GPL release in 2001

17 UIPublish 3 Benefits of GPL release: Encouraged code cleanup and maintenance Improved documentation Users submitted bugs and suggestions Used other GPL code for enhancements Clients considered GPL license as a strength uipublish.sourceforge.net

18 Benefits of Open Source CMSes - 1 Open source CMSes: pre-built but customizable Source code is available Can be customized Can be redistributed No licensing costs

19 Benefits of Open Source CMSes - 2 Numerous alternatives to match different requirements and platforms Community technical support can be strong Commercial technical support may be available Control your own data and CMS strategy Faster & less expensive than building it yourself

20 Examples of Open Source CMSes Review pre-built open source CMSes Innovative approaches to content management All examples licensed under the GNU General Public License (GPL) Most examples use LAMP

21 Mambo CMS for conventional websites MySQL, PHP

22 Community Website / Portal Information hub : Distribute & collect information Discussions: Create a community Personalization: Customized view Syndication: Distribute content to other sites Aggregation: Pull in content from other sites Metadata: Categorize information Retrieval: Indexing and search Workflow: Author, preview, edit, publish

23 Drupal Apache/IIS, MySQL/PostgreSQL, PHP

24 Weblog / Blog - 1 Periodic posts by single or multiple authors Links, summaries, commentary, comments Not just for bloggers writing online journals

25 Weblog / Blog - 2 Effective single-purpose CMS Simple and familiar interface Format benefits authors as well readers Friendlier face to a complex collection Personal voice serves as a guided tour Can be adapted for multiple uses Blog, project log, documentation, simple websites, anything else you can fit into the blog format

26 WordPress MySQL, PHP

27 Learning Management System Conduct online education Supplement face-to-face instruction Uses: Internal staff training Virtual teamwork Build institutional knowledge Open source LMSes provide affordable alternatives to high-cost proprietary LMSes

28 Moodle Multiple courses WYSIWYG Editor Chat Glossaries Multimedia delivery integration MySQL, PHP

29 Wikis Collaborative hyperlinked writing Quick - no need to know HTML Flexible structure - meant to evolve over time Combination of system and social rules Version control: Roll back changes Knowledge bases, internal documentation Intra-agency collaborative writing, brainstorming

30 TikiWiki MySQL, PHP

31 Intranet Need most features discussed in previous examples Customizable workflow Flexible task delegation

32 Plone Complete cross-platform solution Can be used as public website, intranet, or both No need to install web server or database Can use Apache, other databases Based on Zope web application server

33 Plone Zope web application server

34 Zope Open source application server Used to build CMSes and web applications Primarily written in Python Hundreds of companies and thousands of developers contribute to its development

35 Tips Choose stable open source CMSes Commercial technical support may be available for certain CMSes Check CMS for web accessibility (Section 508) Test CMSes: Open Source CMS Compare CMSes: The CMS Matrix

36 Resources Web Content Management With Open Source Software Abhijeet Chavan Recent Articles Open-Source Learning Management with Moodle Developing an Open Source Content Management Strategy For E-Government